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So what were your overall opinions about Engage?


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Ironically, I actually am finding myself more invested in Engage's setting and TH's gameplay, not the other way around.

Edited by Acacia Sgt
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10 hours ago, Jotari said:

I think Three Houses story is a lot more divisive than Engage. Even the people who like Engage's story (of which I count myself among) have weak defenses for it. Everyone is more or less on the same page of "It's quite meh", only with some people finding a meh story something worth getting more upset over. Meanwhile Three House's Story, the morals of the factions involved, its use of themes, much of it's lore being from in game books and a split route that is 80% the same makes for a scenario where emotions are going to be a lot more inflamed and opinions a lot more varied. Which will probably give it a lot more staying power than Engage when it comes to discussions.

Oh, I was comparing them with regards to how many liked each story, but you're right that 3H's plot itself is more divisive. Heck, it's not like 3H's plot is perfect either as you yourself pointed out. Dimitri and Claude have the most fleshed out routes that are mechanically near identical, Edelgard's is shorter and rewrites Fodlan's past* and tweaks personalities to make her more heroic and the final route is identical to Claude's minus his best map (and while I liked the Byleth reveals, you got all of that and more from Cindered Shadows).

* either that or Edelgard

Spoiler

decided the obviously evil people she knew were trying to trick her and have been manipulating her family since she was a kid (at the very least) were telling the truth for some reason,

which puts her lack of critical thinking up there with other much maligned moments in FE history. I won't name specific examples to avoid even further flame wars, but my point was that 3H breaks its own lore just to justify one of its routes so again: it's not perfect.

 

9 hours ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

*It wasn't until Fire Emblem Engage came out that I realized how often I used the word 'engage' in my day-to-day language. Any wordplay is not intentional.

I had a similar revelation (that pun also unintended) myself. Thank goodness Fates didn't keep the "If" name in the West!

@Acacia Sgt: Interestign! Could you tell us more about that, please?

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8 minutes ago, DefyingFates said:

* either that or Edelgard

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decided the obviously evil people she knew were trying to trick her and have been manipulating her family since she was a kid (at the very least) were telling the truth for some reason,

which puts her lack of critical thinking up there with other much maligned moments in FE history.

Hold up a second. I'm gonna spoiler this because it would be the greatest irony if a thread about how 3H discussion have kept the game current in fan circles spiralled into that very discussion, but, 

Spoiler

The only information about Fodlan's past which Edelgard specifically relates on that route does not come from the Agarthans, whom she rightly and obviously distrusts, but from history passed down from Adrestian emperors, i.e. via her father.

Edelgard: In the end, Seiros was victorious. The Immaculate One and her family then took control of Fodlan. I know this because that knowledge is passed down from emperor to emperor. And that is the because the first emperor is the human who cooperated with Seiros, allowing humanity to be controlled in secret.
(CF Chapter 14, scene "The Truth About Relics")

The game isn't breaking anything about its own lore. In fact, this point is corroborated by Rhea herself almost word-for-word on another route:

Rhea: I am not qualified to continue leading the people... Though my intention was to keep the peace in Fódlan, I still propagated a false history and deceived my faithful followers. 
(Rhea S support)

 

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So, here's the broad strokes.

 

Gameplay

Absolutely best in franchise. Love it. Like, what if the player phase of Fates was improved upon, AND enemy phase was also really fun. My tools are versatile, the enemies are threatening but fair, and the mechanics are deep as hell. 

 

Map design

The only games with better map design are the Tellius games (bridge nonwithstanding), and 2 of the best Tellius maps also made it here. The original maps are excellent too.

The only "gripe" I have is that they missed the opportunity to have Elincia's Gambit and CQ10 added. This could have been the perfect collection of Defence greatest hits.

 

Story

Yeah, it sucks. But it doesn't suck in the infuriating dipshit way that Fates does or the insulting Norse fanfiction way that Heroes does. It sucks in the intentional Saturday morning cartoon fashion that's kind of hard to hate. It doesn't make it good, but it almost has a so-bad-it's-good charm... almost.

 

Characters

Quite a mixed bag, honestly. Their largely one-note personalities mean that they range from boring to endearing to incredibly goddamn annoying.

On the positive end, Louis is one of the most genuinely pleasant and amusing characters. Zelkov is unique and endearing. Merrin is adorable and dorky. Alcryst is a lot of fun. Ivy is surprisingly deep.

On the bad side, well, I now owe Nowi an apology because she's no longer the worst, most annoying thing in existence. Hortensia is by a country mile. (Don't worry Nowi, you're still taking the silver.)

 

Art style

Environments look great. Animations and particle effects are slick. Half of the character designs look good (though none are truly exceptional). The other half of the character designs look like Fate Grand Order rejects, including the protagonist. Also, I never thought a game would manage worse generic class outfits than Three Houses, but here we are.

 

Soundtrack

Mirrors the art style in that it's such an eclectic mixed bag that it doesn't even feel consistent. It feels like a bunch of soundtracks mixed together. Some of it sounds good. Some of it is cheesy fun. Some of it is really bad. And some of it is bad, but strangely enjoyable.

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1 hour ago, DefyingFates said:

Interestign! Could you tell us more about that, please?

Um, don't know if I can explain it well. Or explain it at all.

I certainly like stuff like TH's "teaching the students" game mechanics. And Engage's world was more appealing to immerse myself with.

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I haven't finished yet (getting closer and chipping away at it every night), but nonetheless I am far enough in the game to issue a verdict about one thing:

 

This game showcased Intelligent System's absolute, unabashed contempt for Fire Emblem's casual gamers, who probably comprise a solid majority within the franchise.

 

Before every single battle I fight, I go through the usual tedious rounds of securing stat boosts in the Somniel, and even then the vast majority of possible battles I could fight are off-limits to me. I fight what I can.

I wasted an hour tonight on Leif's paralogue, which has to be among the worst thought out maps in all of Fire Emblem history. There's no explanation for why the game's lowest difficulty setting would have a map like this except that the entire development team was high on crack the day they made this one. Its design betrays no hint of an intent that it was meant to be winnable; at least four ballistae are positioned on the corners of the map, out of your reach but able to assuredly pick off a party member every time it strikes. Leif dodges a fair battle, which would've been reasonably challenging in its own right, basically in favor of cheating. At least the Zerg Rushing skirmishes are occasionally doable when the map is as such that you can defend a narrow chokepoint; no such remedial strategy seems to present itself here. But even if there is, I have no interest in looking at this map ever again. I have wasted enough time with Leif and I am moving on.

 

To be clear, I am not just ranting about a single map. This is one particularly egregious example of a pattern I've seen over and over again. Even one early chapter had me commenting "This is harder than Three Houses."

Which would, of course, be fine if that was what I wanted. Anyone who wants a more challenging game should have the option, and indeed they do. But freedom of choice should not be denied those players who just want a moderate challenge for which putting in a decent amount of effort is sure to yield a payoff instead of only frustration.

Beyond this being true in principle, it doesn't make sense from a business standpoint either; in the 1990s, the age of maddeningly hard games the development team was apparently nostalgic for when they made Engage, a video game was a big "entertainment package" that you were expected to invest copious amounts of time into. In that day and age difficulty was a way of extending the play value of a low-powered but expensive cartridge/disk. But people have less patience and shorter attention spans today. If you get stuck on a game today, chances are good you'll just drop it partway through and move on to something else. That the team entrusted with one of Nintendo's most lucrative franchises was totally unable to comprehend this, and instead churned out a rather exclusive game with niche appeal, screams "unprofessional".

 

If this was some esoteric project not intended to have mainstream appeal, then okay. Fine. But it wasn't. This was the frigging successor to Three Houses. Nintendo discussed its desire to bring in new players and introduce those who've never played FE to the series. Its brighter color palette was obviously meant to attract a younger audience. Intelligent Systems had no conceivable excuse for botching this as awfully as they did.

 

...I will follow up with one or more posts in the future whenever I've finished the game at last. But let me preface all of it by saying that I did undeniably get my money's worth. If I were to value the entertainment Engage provided at as little as $1.25 an hour, I would've already surpassed what I shelled out in real life. Each and every complaint that I have must be viewed in light of this.

Edited by Hrothgar777
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Overall it is fairly good, its not displacing any of my top 3 FE games, but it is definitely in the upper half of favorite FE games. It has solid enjoyable gameplay, and a better story than I expected (admittedly my expectations were low...), although definitely better gameplay than story. It doesn't surpass Conquest in the gameplay department, and New Mystery is too different for me to easily compare which I prefer gameplaywise, but it is up there for the series. Storywise its a lot more middling, and it doesn't capture that old Kaga magic of gameplay-story integration either (they try a little with things like the map where you have to collect the emblems in a lesser fell dragon versions, but they always limit these moments to just single map gimmicks). I did appreciate many of the returning maps, many classic, some simply understandable, but FE7 in particular got cheated (and I have been annoyed since FEH about all the Lyn Mulagir retcon). I liked a lot of the loving reference of the emblem abilities as well, but it feels like Lief got cheated a bit too (which also feels like a very FEH move now that I think about it) with a vast majority of his abilities being Genealogy rather than Thracia references, which is especially disappointing as Thracia 776 did a lot of interesting things that they could have easily drawn upon like they did with the other emblems. I certainly have my gripes, but as I said in the beginning Overall fairly good, definitely in the upper half of FE games.

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Engage easily has the weakest cast and story in the whole series. Even with good gameplay I was bored most of the time while playing it and it was a slog to finish it.

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13 hours ago, Hrothgar777 said:

 There's no explanation for why the game's lowest difficulty setting would have a map like this except that the entire development team was high on crack the day they made this one. Its design betrays no hint of an intent that it was meant to be winnable; 

Yeah that sounds like Thracia alright.

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I actually still have yet to play Engage. I bought it the same day I bought Tears of the Kingdom since the store had a used copy of Engage on sale and I haven't played it because I've been playing Tears of the Kingdom, Ocean's Heart and Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak.

For those of you who have played the game, I have a question: I was hoping to get the DLC right away if only so I can give Alear the Tiki emblem asap and pretend that it's Alear's dragon form (I was very disappointed to learn that Alear doesn't actually have a dragon form in this game), but I also want my first playthrough to, for most of it at least, just be the base game content (Tiki Emblem aside obviously). Is it possible to only unlock the Tiki emblem, or does other DLC content have to be unlocked first?

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1 hour ago, vanguard333 said:

I actually still have yet to play Engage. I bought it the same day I bought Tears of the Kingdom since the store had a used copy of Engage on sale and I haven't played it because I've been playing Tears of the Kingdom, Ocean's Heart and Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak.

For those of you who have played the game, I have a question: I was hoping to get the DLC right away if only so I can give Alear the Tiki emblem asap and pretend that it's Alear's dragon form (I was very disappointed to learn that Alear doesn't actually have a dragon form in this game), but I also want my first playthrough to, for most of it at least, just be the base game content (Tiki Emblem aside obviously). Is it possible to only unlock the Tiki emblem, or does other DLC content have to be unlocked first?

It's possible to unlock only Tiki and nothing else from the DLC content (though you'll likely stumble into getting the Three Houses Emblem too since it's kind of just sitting there in a place you'll naturally bump into). Aside from the Three Houses Emblem you have to get Tiki before getting any of the other DLC emblems. So if you only wanted Hector then you'd need to get Tiki+Hector.

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9 hours ago, Jotari said:

It's possible to unlock only Tiki and nothing else from the DLC content (though you'll likely stumble into getting the Three Houses Emblem too since it's kind of just sitting there in a place you'll naturally bump into). Aside from the Three Houses Emblem you have to get Tiki before getting any of the other DLC emblems. So if you only wanted Hector then you'd need to get Tiki+Hector.

Thank you. That's good to hear. I'll make sure to avoid the Three Houses Emblem then (at least until late in the first playthrough).

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1 hour ago, vanguard333 said:

Thank you. That's good to hear. I'll make sure to avoid the Three Houses Emblem then (at least until late in the first playthrough).

Actually, that isn't possible. You must get the Houses Emblem, which is obtained after chapter 6 by walking to a specific corner of the Somniel. They do not have a paralogue, you just get it handed to you. After you get Edelgard, you unlock Tiki's paralogue, and after beating that one, all the rest.

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1 minute ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Actually, that isn't possible. You must get the Houses Emblem, which is obtained after chapter 6 by walking to a specific corner of the Somniel. They do not have a paralogue, you just get it handed to you. After you get Edelgard, you unlock Tiki's paralogue, and after beating that one, all the rest.

Oh wait that's necessary? Guess I just did it incidentally earlier and assumed the island would open regardless.

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48 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Actually, that isn't possible. You must get the Houses Emblem, which is obtained after chapter 6 by walking to a specific corner of the Somniel. They do not have a paralogue, you just get it handed to you. After you get Edelgard, you unlock Tiki's paralogue, and after beating that one, all the rest.

Oh. Never mind then. Is there anything I miss if I get the Houses Emblem that early in the game? Or can I just leave it unused for a while and have nothing really change?

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1 hour ago, vanguard333 said:

Oh. Never mind then. Is there anything I miss if I get the Houses Emblem that early in the game? Or can I just leave it unused for a while and have nothing really change?

They have no paralogue and otherwise behave like a normal emblem, so no. You can just grab them and leave them to gather dust until later if you want.

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On 5/26/2023 at 2:00 PM, Dark Holy Elf said:

Hold up a second. I'm gonna spoiler this because it would be the greatest irony if a thread about how 3H discussion have kept the game current in fan circles spiralled into that very discussion, but, 

I'm going to avoid talking about this too because there's a thread in the 3H forum about this topic (and to not derail this one) but I'll just say that you make a fair point and leave it at that.

On 5/26/2023 at 3:02 PM, Fabulously Olivier said:

On the bad side, well, I now owe Nowi an apology because she's no longer the worst, most annoying thing in existence. Hortensia is by a country mile. (Don't worry Nowi, you're still taking the silver.)

She makes a very bad first impression, but she's got surprising depth too. I recommend looking up some of her supports on YouTube if you can't bring yourself to use her enough to unlock them yourself. And I say this as someone who also assumed she would be a one-trick pony and Ivy would be another Camilla!

On 5/26/2023 at 3:12 PM, Acacia Sgt said:

I certainly like stuff like TH's "teaching the students" game mechanics. And Engage's world was more appealing to immerse myself with.

Oh, I get it. The micro-managing aspect of the former is quite fun (it can get tedious too, but the premise is fun) and Engage's world being simpler and more vibrant does have its advantages when drawing people in 🙂

On 5/28/2023 at 8:50 AM, Hrothgar777 said:

I wasted an hour tonight on Leif's paralogue, which has to be among the worst thought out maps in all of Fire Emblem history. There's no explanation for why the game's lowest difficulty setting would have a map like this except that the entire development team was high on crack the day they made this one. Its design betrays no hint of an intent that it was meant to be winnable; at least four ballistae are positioned on the corners of the map, out of your reach but able to assuredly pick off a party member every time it strikes. Leif dodges a fair battle, which would've been reasonably challenging in its own right, basically in favor of cheating. At least the Zerg Rushing skirmishes are occasionally doable when the map is as such that you can defend a narrow chokepoint; no such remedial strategy seems to present itself here. But even if there is, I have no interest in looking at this map ever again. I have wasted enough time with Leif and I am moving on.

First off:

On 5/28/2023 at 10:29 PM, Jotari said:

Yeah that sounds like Thracia alright.

xD

But also, maybe it was meant to counteract Leif's Adaptability messing things up for him as it can for the player? That only struck me now, but it would make sense!

(P.S. I really hope that if the FE4 remake is real, they streamline the maps instead of going for a 1:1 approach a la SoV...)

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2 minutes ago, DefyingFates said:

She makes a very bad first impression, but she's got surprising depth too. I recommend looking up some of her supports on YouTube if you can't bring yourself to use her enough to unlock them yourself. And I say this as someone who also assumed she would be a one-trick pony and Ivy would be another Camilla!

She also has the best personality trait of all, World Tree!

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1 hour ago, DefyingFates said:

Oh, I get it. The micro-managing aspect of the former is quite fun (it can get tedious too, but the premise is fun) and Engage's world being simpler and more vibrant does have its advantages when drawing people in 🙂

Also quite rewarding, to see your long-term goals paid off, heh.

I guess another factor is that I actually find myself engaging more with the Monastery and its activities than the Somniel's. By the time I was in the late game in Engage I had long stopped doing certain activities. Unlike right now that I'm playing through TH and still try to do everything possible. I'd even say, I've found TH's Fishing minigame better than Engage's.

Not sure on the simpler bit, but instead I think it's because it's more... fantastical. Feels more like the kind of stuff I seek more in fiction. Also as plus I guess, as having taken up fanfic writing for quite some time now, Engage stimulates more my creativity than TH does, heh.

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8 hours ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Not sure on the simpler bit, but instead I think it's because it's more... fantastical.

That's on me for using the wrong adjective, my bad! I agree that it's more pure fun to think about a world like that compared to a more grounded world like Fodlan's. On the other hand, Fodlan's obviously going to be much more enticing for people who like political intrigue and more... grounded? Nuanced? stories/ theorizing.

8 hours ago, Acacia Sgt said:

I've found TH's Fishing minigame better than Engage's.

There's more RNG, but it's also much faster so I get it 😛

10 hours ago, Jotari said:

She also has the best personality trait of all, World Tree!

Also true!

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I got kinda burnt out on chapter 18 (some boat map) and haven´t played since....... March? But I also think I screwed myself out of a lot of fun potential.

Ignored the story, I assumed it´d be some kinda "assemble the infinity embwems and defeat the ewil dwagon" type deal. Character design... on the one hand ButcherOne/Diamant/Zelkov and from what I´ve seen Lindon and Saphir too, on the other hand Ivy. I´d much prefer straightforward fanservice over Celines/Ivys/Hortensias/Panettes/Timerras cutesy nonsense designs.

The Somniel was ignored beyond it´s shops - I think you get notifications when there is new stock, so props for that, even if I hardly made use of shops, smithing etc to begin with, outside of getting staves. If it looked like a minigame I ignored it. The running around between Arena and Ring Chamber was extraordinarily annoying. Generally navigating of menus, some information just not being there (I think weapon damage couldn´t be directly seen in the unit tab?) made the process of managing your units tedious. 

As for forging, the only weapons that ever looked worth it were Alears personal weapon and I think some Killer weapons, because good lord do the enemies have HP. Engravings give no tactical advantage whatsoever. Or that´s what it felt like, some of these engravings drawbacks seemed too monumental to commit and on Maddening +1, -1 dmg is just lol. Weapons generally seemed... bad? Subpar? I´ve expressed my grievance with effective weapons in this game and the enemies stats preventing these weapons from being, y´know, effective, in the unpopular opinion thread.

The Engage weapon triangle... not a fan tbh. Not only do you get to watch out for your EP to not get ko´ed now your mayhaps only unit capable of taking on said enemy/enemies might not even be able to deal damage in return. By choice of units and classes I hadn´t really gotten to try out backup and poison, the former at least being clutch in Goldmary/Rosados map against the fire dragons the latter being practically irrelevant since I didn´t use any of the dagger people.

Unit quality... if every subsequent recruit obsoletes any prior user of a similar weapon it is too low/lopsided (barring Kagetsu, true-born heir to the Raijinto). The only early units retaining any kind of relevance aside from Alear where Chloe who get fed stat boosts out the wazoo only to be the usual disappointing flying pegasus and Diamant whose performance hinged on Tiki alone. Framme/Clanne/Vander are the saddest Felicia/Jacob/Gunther imitation imaginable. Generally disappointing how many of the PS in the game look like they just ripped something from Fates/TH or just had a staff meeting on how to make the least worthwhile skills possible or the utterly uninspired nature of Kagetsus/Zelkovs and Goldmarys/Rosados PS. 

Map design. Most of the time it boiled down to "How am I supposed to do this?" and 5-10 hours later there´d be a "How did I do this?" If I had a plan, some reinforcements, the wolf riders in Fogados chapter and the Ice Dragons in Tikis paralogue especially, would require me restarting the map, specifically for them. I think the only other emblem maps i managed to beat were Ike´s, because he´s critically allergic to magic and... maybe Lucinas? 

Emblems... eh, they are what happen when you look at gambits and pair-up and combine them, except you can reload. I think unit development/quality hinges too much on the rings they get, for it to be a good mechanic. The only ones I had good success with was Lyn, because high magic doubling is good, other than that, they´ve amounted to stat boosts and a sometimes strong attack and not much else. I guess part of that assessment is me fucking up and not getting rngrings for my units when I had them so they could start banking a currency with which to buy skills.

all in all, 6/10 for suspicion of user error

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1 hour ago, Imuabicus said:

The running around between Arena and Ring Chamber was extraordinarily annoying. 

Oh yes, very very much so. I'm surprised it got past play testing in that form. Fortunately for future generations our pain will be a note of trivia as they fixed it with a path pretty quickly.

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The gameplay is among the best in the series but I feel some points should be docked because the late game of Engage has this bizarre obsession with reinforcement spawns. It seems that in every late game map you'll get bombarded with waves of reinforcements every single turn, that never ever ever stop coming. Typically those waves of reinforcements are flying ones too.

I get the logic behind it. Its to force the player to get a move on rather than play over defensively. But surely there are more graceful ways to adress this then tell the player ''If you don't hurry up we're going to swarm you to death'' for several chapters in a row. 

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